


Tumblr Snippets: The Magnus Archives

by j quadrifrons (Jenavira)



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Episode Tag, F/M, First Kiss, Fluff, Gen, M/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Snippets, Tumblr Prompt, Web!Martin, general sap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-21
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2020-03-08 22:16:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 6,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18903727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenavira/pseuds/j%20quadrifrons
Summary: Short fics (under 1k) written for tumblr prompts and headcanon requests.12/20: Mixed Feelings, Melanie & Helen (aka Helenie got jossed so I wrote this)





	1. Caretaking (Jon/Martin)

**Author's Note:**

> I guess I write enough of these now to need ANOTHER Tumblr Snippets work

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written after finishing season one, the day season two started airing

The door creaked open behind him, and Jonathan sighed. Another recording ruined. “Yes, I’ll be going home as soon as I wrap this up,” he said, doing his best (which was, to be honest, not very good) to keep the annoyance out of his voice. Elias had become more gently critical, of late, of Jonathan’s hours. 

“Yeah, I know.” It wasn’t Elias after all; it was Martin. 

Of course it was Martin.

“Oh, you’re recording, aren’t you - I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt. I’m sorry,” Martin stumbled over his apology. “Here.” He slipped forward and reached around Jonathan, setting a plate and a mug down on the table next to the tape recorder. “Sorry,” he said again.

Jonathan stared down at the offering, then looked up at his assistant. “What’s this?”

“Um.” Martin bit his lip. “It’s a cup of tea, and a sandwich?”

“Obviously.” The tone was maybe a bit much, Jonathan realized as he said it, but really, did Martin think he was thick?

“It’s just,” Martin went on, “you’ve been working very late hours lately, and you seem to be losing weight, not that I’ve been paying attention, it’s just that I see a lot of you, well not a lot, but we’re in here together a lot, and - “ He caught Jonathan’s look and wrapped up in a hurry. “You never went out for lunch, and it’s past six. I thought you might be hungry. Sorry for interrupting your recording,” he added, when Jonathan’s expression didn’t change.

Really, in spite of the recording. Jonathan couldn’t bring himself to be too annoyed. He was hungry, for one thing, although he hadn’t noticed it until Martin had brought it up. (He’d had lunch in his office, but there was no reason for Martin to know that, but that had been hours ago.) And it was…thoughtful. Actually, Martin had been unusually thoughtful lately, and it had been some time - weeks - since he’d brought anything disruptive into the archive. He really ought to think about being nicer to his assistant, Jonathan reflected.

“Well,” he said slowly, drawing it out for the pleasure of watching Martin anticipate a dressing-down that wasn’t coming. (Not too nice.) “Thank you.” 

“W -” Martin said. “I - Um - You’re welcome.” 

Jonathan looked pointedly at the steaming tea, at his tape recorder, and then back at Martin.

“Right,” Martin said. “Well. I’ll let you finish up, then.” And he scurried out of the room, closing the door behind him, still looking a bit shocked.

Jonathan picked up the statement he’d been reading into the tape recorder, then set it back down again and picked up the mug. He didn’t really have a preference for how he took his tea, but it was very strong, and very hot, and very good. He supposed the statement could wait a little longer.


	2. Touch (Jon/Martin)

jon stops breathing when martin’s hand touches his, he’s been thinking about this for  _so long_ , he was sure he’d given up all his chances (georgie told him to take the second chance but she didn’t think this was it, and he hasn’t realized until just now how hard he’s been trying to prove her wrong), and he wants to be careful, he wants to be sure, but he twists his wrist around and laces his fingers with martin’s before he can stop himself, holding on like he’ll never let go. “i missed you,” he says again, but the change in tense is everything.

martin closes his eyes and takes a shaky breath, and for a moment the bottom drops out of jon’s stomach,  _too much, too soon, he told you to leave him alone_ , and then martin opens his eyes and smiles at him, a shadow of his old sunny cheerfulness, but it’s not at all forced. ‘i missed you too,’ he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [somuchbetterthanthat demanded hand touching and confessions](https://backofthebookshelf.tumblr.com/post/184792058881/i-justneedjon-and)


	3. Spiders (canon-typical gen)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This isn't even a fic, it's a tumblr post, but it grew so much and it took me so long to write that I'm putting it in here anyway.

I found this book while weeding last month

and my first thought was, well, Martin  ~~buys a copy~~  has a copy lying around for situations like this, and shoves it in his bag the day after he carefully escorts a spider out of Jon’s office before Jon can squish it with extreme prejudice. Jon catches him coming back in, wants to know what Martin’s been doing, and when he explains Jon rolls his eyes and tells him he honestly shouldn’t bother, Jon is perfectly capable of squishing spiders on his own, and Martin launches into a  ~~special interest gush~~  lecture about spiders’ vital role in the local ecosystem, and Jon explains that that’s fine, sure, but they have all those legs which is clearly unacceptable, and Martin is legitimately annoyed at Jon for, like, possibly the first time ever

So he brings the book in fully intending to give it to Jon with a reminder about ecosystems and insects (there are all kinds of paper-eating things that spiders can help keep down, those little silver worms they keep finding for one) but when he gets in there’s Elias in Jon’s office, and of course Jon’s always in a terrible mood after talking to his boss, so Martin leaves the book in his bag, no point in  _asking_ Jon to get annoyed with him. And then he’s going out to do some followup, and then Jon’s taking a statement from someone who didn’t want to just sit down and write it out, and then it’s been an entire week and Martin still has this damn spider book in his bag and it’s driving him crazy so he just…leaves it on Jon’s desk one morning. He fully intended to say something about it, but he forgot.

Of course now Jon comes in to find this  ~~adorable ball of eyes~~  monster spider face staring at him first thing in the morning, and he does not shriek, thank you very much, that was a perfectly reasonable exclamation of surprise on looking down at his desk and finding something that is very much not supposed to be there. Of course there’s no question where it came from, even without the “Martin K. Blackwood” scrawled in rather childish handwriting on the inside of the cover (Martin’s had this book for a while). All right then. If that’s how it’s going to be, Jon knows how to deal with passive-aggression.

(Jonathan Sims has not yet conceded defeat in the two-year standing conflict with Bertrand Collins, his first desk-neighbor in Research at the Magnus Institute. The other researchers called it a prank war, but it was a battle to the death. Jon hasn’t seen Bertie since his promotion to Head Archivist, but that doesn’t mean it’s over, just that the time scale has changed.)

It could have gone horribly wrong. He could have gone for a generic retaliation, something that Martin would not have understood but would have hurt him terribly, like flatly refusing all of Martin’s offers of tea (but he’s gotten very used to a cuppa in the afternoon, and it turns out Martin is very good at tea). But no, Jon is not terribly good at subtlety, and he opts for a spider-related broadside. The next spider he smashes with a case file, he leaves the file on Martin’s desk, with a note to see about ordering some replacement file folders. The smear on the manila folder still has eight distinct legs. It’s almost artistic.

Martin is livid. He complains at Tim about it all day. Tim is thrilled; they’ve been working together a whole four months and he’s already sick to death of Martin defending every single thing their obnoxiously uptight boss does. (Also, honestly, who develops a crush on Jonathan Sims when Tim Stoker is  _right there_? It’s a hit to his pride, definitely.) Sasha tries to be sympathetic and noncommittal - she’s not a huge spider fan, honestly, and she would not have had a great reaction to finding that picture on her desk unexpectedly, no matter how adorable Martin thinks it is - but it turns out that Martin when he’s angry is viciously hilarious. She’s filing away insults to use on the next guy who hits on her when she’s out trying to pick up girls.

It’s Tim who suggests striking back; no matter how upset he is, Martin would never have considered actually intentionally trying to annoy his boss, even if his boss wasn’t Jonathan Sims. But he is still pissed off - it’s one thing to be annoyed at Martin, it’s another thing to take it out on a helpless creature - so he goes along with Tim’s suggestion to start sneaking realistic plastic spiders into the file boxes.

The skirmish (you couldn’t call this one a war; Martin just doesn’t have that level of vindictiveness, no matter how much Tim goads him on) goes on for six months, but is fairly well disrupted by Jane Prentiss. Martin can’t bring himself to keep at it once he’s living in the Archives. It feels like cheating (and besides, Jon just…invited him to stay in the Archives. Martin never expected to be believed, never mind for Jon to actually try to help him). Martin declares an official truce when he sees Jon trap a spider under a used tea mug and toss it resignedly out the window. Jon mutters something about having one less thing to be paranoid about.

(Every once in a while, while going through an obscure corner of the Archives, Jon finds another of those plastic spiders. They still make him jump, dammit. He had quite a stash of them in his desk drawer, but while he was in the hospital, someone cleared them out. He hopes it was Martin.)


	4. Caretaking II (Jon/Martin)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a (very optimistic) episode tag for 139

He needn't have worried, actually; he finds Martin five hundred yards from the entrance to the tunnels, a little battered and bruised but triumphantly clutching a leatherbound volume of Robert Smirke's original writings on the various rituals. The pride on his face makes Jon's chest ache and he doesn't know what to say. He bites back an old reflexive impulse to scold him for being so reckless and what comes out instead is, "My God, Martin," in an almost worshipful tone, and Martin grins at him. Then he lists a little too far to the side and nearly falls over, and Jon has a hand under his elbow without thinking.

"Come on," he says, "it isn't safe down here," and Martin laughs breathlessly. "You're not wrong," he says, and Jon desperately wants to ask what happened, wants to know the origin of the purpling bruise on his arm and the scrapes on his hands and the long scratch across his cheek, but he knows he wouldn't be able to keep the compulsion out of his voice and he won't do that to Martin.

Instead he sits Martin down at his desk and tells him to wait, and even if it's more pleading than stern Martin just nods, exhaustion catching up to him as he slumps in Jon's chair. Jon's hands are shaking as he digs through the cupboards in the Archive break room for the first aid kit. (It's gotten...significantly more substantial since the last time he needed it. Unsurprising, probably, given everything that went on in his absence.) When he returns to his office, Martin is resting his head on his folded arms.

Jon's hand flutters over his shoulder, not quite touching. "Martin?" he says quietly, reluctant to wake him if he is sleeping.

"Mmph," Martin says, and sits back up slowly. "I'm fine," he says, his voice rough in a way that says he's probably lying. "It's just. It's been a really long day." He scrubs his face with his hands, winces when he catches the cut on his cheek. "I'm fine."

"Right," Jon says, "right. But I - you should probably clean those cuts. Lord knows what's in those tunnels."

"Worms?" Martin says, and it's a feeble attempt at a joke, but Jon smiles anyway, and Martin smiles back, just a little.

He doesn't reach for the first aid kit, though, just frowns at it like he's trying to work out what it's for, and Jon recognizes that level of exhaustion with a twinge of sympathy. "May I?" he asks softly, and Martin nods.

Jon can't look at him suddenly, focuses on pulling out bandages and ointment and sterile wipes to clean the grit from Martin's hands. "Will. Ah. Can you tell me what happened?" He keeps his eyes on what he's doing as Martin begins to tell him everything, Peter Lukas and his promises, the statements from Adelard Dekker and Robert Smirke, the Extinction and the rituals and Jonah Magnus's broken promises. He's grateful, for once, for the Archivist, because he can listen and absorb all the new information while at the same time he's painfully aware of Martin's hands, skin so soft where it's still whole, fingers curling a little from the sting of the antiseptic. His nails are bitten short, did Martin always bite his nails, or was that new since he was working with Peter Lukas? Jon can't believe he doesn't know.

Martin falls silent and Jon realizes that he's now just sitting here holding Martin's hands in his. Martin is watching him carefully and Jon can't work out what the guarded expression on his face means. The cut on his cheek is still seeping blood slowly, and he'll have to take care of that next, but first Jon needs to remember how to breathe. 


	5. "That's the worst joke I've ever heard" (Jon/Martin)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> @auralqueer requested #43 from the [OTP Prompt List](https://backofthebookshelf.tumblr.com/post/185259949346/45-otp-prompts)

It’s weird being back in the Archives after so long. So much has changed while Martin was gone, and while of course he wouldn’t expect it to be the same, exactly, the whole thing gives him the feeling that he’s still not properly back. His own desk is just as he left it, but Tim’s has been cleared and sits like a monument in the back of the assistants’ office. Melanie comes and goes at all kinds of odd hours, which wouldn’t be all that unusual except that she apparently lives here now. Basira still sits in odd corners rather than claiming a desk like a normal person, but her reading material has gotten decidedly more esoteric. (And around here, that’s saying something.)

Strangest of all is Daisy, who’s just Daisy now, not “Detective Tonner” or “weird murder cop.” Martin had been roughly aware of her while he was working for Peter, of course, had known that Jon had gone into the coffin to bring her back, but he hadn’t been prepared for how - well, how nice she was. That she and Jon were friends, people who went out for drinks together and listened to the Archers together and sat around talking about nothing when Jon was falling too deep into the statements and needed a distraction.

Which is what they’re doing now, apparently, sat in the corner of the Archives that has slowly grown from “where the kettle and mugs live” to “an entire sofa and enough supplies to feed all five of them for a week,” which, to be fair, is not unreasonable as preparedness goes. Martin would probably be more unhappy about it if Jon hadn’t given him a soft, expectant look when he mentioned he was dying for a cup of tea.

This much at least feels familiar; this feels good. Making the tea, listening to the conversation in the rest of the Archives. The people are different but the situation’s the same, and if there’s an ache of loss for the ones who aren’t here any more, there’s comfort in the continuity anyway. And it’s good to hear Jon’s voice sounding relaxed for once, sounding happy, talking about something trivial like the library staff’s ongoing war with the researchers instead of the end of the world.

Martin hands Daisy her tea - she’s sitting on the floor, back against the wall, and how can one person’s legs take up so much space anyway, honestly she’s worse than Tim - and sits down on the sofa next to Jon just as she makes a crack about someone “checking out” one of the librarians, complete with eyebrow waggle. “That was the worst joke I’ve ever heard,” Martin groans, but at the same time Jon tips his head back and actually laughs, a sound Martin suddenly realizes he’s never actually heard before, and if the trade for Daisy’s appalling sense of humor is the long line of Jon’s throat and the sweep of his eyelashes against his cheek and the rich sound of his happiness, well. Martin will learn to adjust.


	6. "You're cute even when you make that face" (Jon/Martin)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> avatarofthevast's request from the [OTP Prompt List](https://backofthebookshelf.tumblr.com/post/185259949346/45-otp-prompts)

It’s not often that either of them get the chance to sleep in, so when Martin wakes up just a little after sunrise on a day when, unbelievably, neither he nor Jon have anywhere to be, he decides to enjoy it. Besides, outside the bed is cold (Jon insists that he can’t sleep when it’s too warm, which apparently means that the windows stay open unless there’s actually snow blowing in) but here under the blankets, with Jon in his arms, it’s warm and cozy, and he has no desire to move.

Martin snuggles a little more securely into the nest of pillows, shifting so he can see Jon’s face in the early morning light that burnishes gold highlights in his skin. It isn’t quite true that he looks younger when he sleeps - exhaustion and worry have worn lines around his eyes that never quite fade - but he does at least look peaceful. That’s good; it means no nightmares, at least not right now. Early-morning nightmares are the worst, they put him in a sour mood all day long. Not, given what he knows of their contents, that Martin can blame him.

He gives in to the impulse to run his fingers through Jon’s hair, tracing the threads of gray one by one. He likes to think they manage to maintain a professional relationship at work, but this is the one thing that can drive Martin mad with longing, no matter how terrible the statements are they’re researching. When Jon is frowning angrily at a bit of Gertrude’s notes that doesn’t make sense, or slumped in exhaustion after recording another statement, Martin just wants to stand next to him and run his hands through Jon’s hair until he relaxes, just a little.

Jon stirs at last, blinking up at him with that happy but confused look in his eyes he always has when he wakes up next to Martin, and for once Martin doesn’t try to bite back his smile. “You’re watching me,” Jon mumbles, and he might be trying for accusatory but he’s still too sleepy and it just comes out soft.

“Mm-hmm.” Martin kisses his forehead, right between the eyes. “You’re cute.” Jon’s face twists a little, skepticism and embarrassment and happiness all tangled together. “You’re cute even when you make that face.” Jon wrinkles his nose, and Martin kisses him again. In self-defense, Jon tucks his face into Martin’s shoulder. Not a terrible outcome, Martin decides, tightening his arm around Jon’s back.

“What time is it?” Jon asks into Martin’s shirt, and yawns.

“Doesn’t matter,” Martin answers, “go back to sleep,” and they do.


	7. "Is that my shirt?" (Peter/Elias)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> anon requested #16 from the [OTP Prompt List](https://backofthebookshelf.tumblr.com/post/185259949346/45-otp-prompts) (Lonely Eyes)

It wasn’t that he had a particular need to sneak up on his husband - ex-husband? Peter could never remember. It was just that, like everything else in their relationship, Peter wasn’t willing to make anything too easy. Besides, you didn’t need the Eye to follow the shipping schedules, and docking the  _Tundra_ under another name would be cheating. He’d tried that already.

He didn’t have a key, but that didn’t stop him from walking into Elias’s flat like it was his own. Good bourbon on the sideboard, as usual; he poured himself a glass before investigating the fridge. Sparse, but that was hardly surprising. He dipped a finger in a jar of hummus and licked it off while inspecting the vodka in the freezer.

The study, as predicted, was empty, although there was a light still burning above the desk. Peter turned it off with a click of his tongue; he hoped that wasn’t meant to be a misleading clue. Tragic what things had come to if it was.

He found Elias in bed, propped up against the headboard on several pillows, wearing a loose button-down shirt and making notes on a sheaf of printouts. “Ah, the glamorous life of an administrator,” Peter said, coming fully out of the fog only at the foot of the bed. Elias didn’t look up from his notes.

“If our grantors hadn’t waited so long to finalize this year’s applications,” Elias said as calmly as if they were carrying on a conversation from only minutes ago, “I wouldn’t be up at one in the morning reconciling the budget.” A graceful swirl of the glossy vintage fountain pen in his hand punctuated the statement.

“Terrible,” Peter said with mock sympathy. “You should let them know how much they’ve inconvenienced you.” Then he looked again at Elias and narrowed his eyes. “Is that my shirt?”

“Of course not.” Elias struck something out very firmly on the page in front of him. But it was his shirt, hanging loosely over Elias’s narrower shoulders and still smelling faintly of sea spray. Peter let a grin lick across his face. “Missed me?” he asked, lechery in his voice.

Elias looked up then, pinning him with those unfathomable grey eyes. Peter let his grin widen as the spine-tingling sense of being watched crept up the back of his neck and into his skull. “Of course not,” Elias said, but the smile pulling at the corner of his mouth called him a liar.


	8. first kiss (Jon/Georgie)

Jon walked Georgie home after the show. It had been nice, surprisingly. He would never choose to go to a poetry reading of his own free will, it was an assignment for class, but if he had to go it was nice to go with Georgie. She didn’t take offense at his sarcastic commentary, and offered quite a bit of her own in return, making him laugh instead of growing increasingly annoyed until he could manage to leave.

Instead of sneaking out as soon as he could justify it, they’d stayed until the end, and it was well past dark. He kept stealing glances at Georgie in the orange light of the streetlamps, trying not to stare and painfully aware he was failing. Her perfume smelled faintly of lilacs, out of place in the late autumn night, and it was disorienting him badly.

At the door to her building she stopped and looked at him with an expression Jon couldn’t place. It went on a moment too long before he caught himself and stammered, “I, we, I should–”

Georgie laughed silently, and that was one of the things he liked so much about her, that he never felt like she was laughing at him. “It is the third date,” she said, smiling, “you can absolutely kiss me now.”

Jon blinked, trying to catch up. “It is?” They’d been out together more than three times, surely, but he hadn’t thought any of them were _dates_ …

She put her hand at the back of his neck, thumb toying with the short hair behind his ear for a moment before she pulled him down just a bit and her mouth was on his, sweet and soft and generous. Jon breathed in, head swimming with the scent of lilacs.

He didn’t feel his brain was fully back online before she pulled away, but she left her hand in his hair. “Not had much practice with that, have you?” she asked teasingly.

Jon flushed and would have flinched away, but her hand on his neck was steadying. “I,” he said, “no, I.” He swallowed, not sure how to finish that sentence.

“That’s okay,” Georgie said, leaning in to press another quick kiss to the corner of his mouth before letting go to fit the key to the door. “We can fix that.”


	9. overlooked (martin)

“Hi, sorry - Martin, isn’t it?”

Martin jerks in surprise and nearly drops the sugar jar into his cup. He saves it before he splashes coffee all over his new shirt and sets it down carefully. He doesn’t spend a lot of time out in public any more, but Peter had sent him out with an order for such a ridiculously complex latte that the barista had sighed while punching it into the computer. Martin doesn’t even know why he ordered a plain coffee for himself; he doesn’t like the stuff.

He turns around slowly, expecting another monster because who else is going to recognize him in a Chelsea coffee shop? But the young woman smiling nervously at him from behind thick-rimmed glasses, dark braids streaked with purple piled up on top of her head in a messy bun, doesn’t look like a monster. She doesn’t feel like a monster either, which he knows is more important. She seems like - just a person. A person who does, now that he thinks of it, look vaguely familiar.

“Sorry,” she says again, and Martin realizes he’s still not answered her. “I thought -”

“Yeah,” he says, “that’s - sorry, do I know you?” It’s more than a little rude, but he thinks it’s probably justified, and besides, he is out of practice.

She blinks and he thinks she blushes, though her skin is too dark for him to really be sure. “Not really, I guess. You work at the Magnus Institute, right?” She lowers her voice a little at the name and steps away from the crowded counter. Martin picks up his still-black coffee and Peter’s sugary monstrosity and follows her.

This is…not how conversations about the Institute usually go. “I do?” he says. “I mean - yeah, I do.”

“You don’t remember me,” she says, a little abashed. “That’s fine, no reason you should. I just wanted to say thank you.” Martin almost drops his coffee again, but he tightens his grip and holds on to the paper cups a little too fiercely as she continues. “I came in to give a statement, about a year. I was nervous as hell, not used to talking to people anymore, and the whole place spooked me pretty bad.” She flips a loose braid over her shoulder. “Your boss wasn’t there, but you gave me all the forms and explained everything, and you made me tea.”

He does remember her now, although he can’t dredge up a name. She’d come in while Jon was in America, shaky and grey, and Martin had sat with her and talked her through the paperwork. He’d learned his lesson about taking statements directly, but there was no question of asking her to come back later.

Martin doesn’t remember the tea specifically, but he always made tea for the people who came in to give statements. It had seemed like the least he could do.

“I’m so sorry,” he blurts out, thinking of everything that’s happened to most of the people who give statements to the Magnus Institute. “I’m really, really sorry.”

She smiles, kindly this time. “No, it’s fine. Like I said, I wanted to say thank you. It was - I won’t say I felt better, after. But it was good to be believed.” Her voice gets quiet again, but it’s more thoughtful than trying not to be overheard. “It helped.” There’s a quiet moment, then she rolls her eyes at herself and laughs to break the tension. “Sorry, that’s a lot for a morning coffee run. I hope I haven’t made you late for work.”

“No, it’s, um.” Martin gestures with the two cups. “My boss sent me out for it. I - it was good to see you,” he says, surprised to find that he means it. “I’m glad you’re doing well.”

“You too,” she says with a grin, and she waves a friendly goodbye.

Martin is halfway back to the Institute before he realizes he never did put any cream in his coffee. It tastes foul without it, bitter and syrupy at the same time, and he drops it in a garbage bin distractedly. _It helped_ , he keeps hearing her say. _It helped_.

The day goes faster, after that, and the silence in his office seems a little less oppressive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "It’s always too soon to go home. And it’s always too soon to calculate effect. I once read an anecdote by someone in Women Strike for Peace (WSP), the first great antinuclear movement in the United States… The woman from WSP told of how foolish and futile she felt standing in the rain one morning protesting at the Kennedy White House. Years later she heard Dr. Benjamin Spock—who had become one of the most high-profile activists on the issue—say that the turning point for him was spotting a small group of women standing in the rain, protesting at the White House. If they were so passionately committed, he thought, he should give the issue more consideration himself."  
> \--Rebecca Solnit, _Hope in the Dark_


	10. caught (martin/elias)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [wildehack](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tyleet) wanted to know more about my Martin/Elias feels and *gestures vaguely*

It isn’t quite true that Elias had never looked twice at Martin Blackwood.  He’d been interesting, when he was first hired, this sweet-faced young man with a touch of the Beholding and a desperately kept secret. But the truth of it was petty and small, as most secrets were, and Elias had simply turned him loose in Research to fend for himself, his perpetual worry about being found out a steady stream of fear to feed his patron.

There isn’t much of that scared young man left in the Martin who stands before him today, his glare as fierce as any gaze the Beholding can summon, the chill of the Lonely still clinging to his clothes. On reflection, even as a terrified teenager there had been something of this steel in Martin; pity he hadn’t noticed it sooner. It could have been so useful.

“I suppose you think that you’re just going to go back to running the place now,” Martin says. He’s taller now that he doesn’t hunch his shoulders trying not to be seen, tall enough that he glares down his nose at Elias even from across the room.

“That was the idea, yes.” The murder charges had been dropped, of course. Tape recorded confessions are one thing but there isn’t any actual evidence, and decades of police resentment of the Head of the Magnus Institute can only go so far.

Martin, instead of backing down, moves forward. Elias, stood in front of his desk, back in his place of power at last, just watches him. He’s learned to use his height to intimidate - a trick he’s picked up from Peter, no doubt. Elias tilts his chin to keep in eye contact, and though he hates the vulnerability of exposing his throat he keeps it off his face. He has nothing to fear here.

“The thing is,” Martin says, “we’ve done really well without you, it turns out. Nobody needs you here, and nobody wants you here. So it would probably be for the best if you left us all alone. Probably before Melanie finds out you’re back and starts getting creative. She’s gotten much better since the last time she tried to kill you,” he adds.

Elias smirks; it’s nearly a reflex for him, but it’s also very good to see the annoyance in Martin’s eyes. “I’m sure you feel that way,” he says soothingly. “We’ll see what Jon has to say, shall we? Since I’m quite certain you haven’t asked for his input before coming up here and throwing down ultimatums.”

The flash of anger that crosses Martin’s face is fascinating, but Elias doesn’t get much chance to observe it before Martin is all the way into his space, his head dipping down, his teeth sinking into Elias’s lip. Elias kisses back on instinct, pushing into it, swiping his tongue across Martin’s upper lip. He manages a scrape of teeth of his own and hums in satisfaction Martin has a hand high up on Elias’s shoulder, his thumb pressing into the jugular, and the other is leaning on the desk, caging him in.

He’s already much too out of breath and it takes him just a moment too long to notice the threads weaving loosely about him, then tightening, pulling. The part of him that always watches the Archives is cut off, and Elias jerks away from Martin’s mouth with a gasp. Martin is smiling at him, cold and distant; another thing, Elias thinks fuzzily, he’s learned from Peter. Elias knows that expression all too well. “I did ask nicely,” Martin says, as the spiderwebs pull tighter around them both and Elias begins to think that he’s made a miscalculation.


	11. lonely eyes fixit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers through (and au from) 159

“You said it wouldn’t be that bad.” 

Elias doesn’t look up. There’s a lot of paperwork to do, no small amount of it on Peter’s own account. He’s been back at the Institute for a month now, and he’s still finding utterly baffling disasters in the payroll. Granted, payroll is…substantially smaller than it had been when he’d left.

“I was as surprised as you by how powerful my Archivist had become,” he says. “He’d certainly shown no signs of it up to that point.”

“Nonsense,” Peter says as he settles down in the visitor’s chair. Elias doesn’t need to look up at him to admire the perfectly creased line of his trousers or the casual way he slings an arm over the back of the chair. “You planned every inch of that encounter down to the last. I’ll admit, you may not have directly manipulated that Lonely little employee of yours, but you knew exactly how he’d react, and just how he’d betray me. And what was he to you? You can’t tell me you don’t know your Archivist just as well, especially not after the last one.”

Elias allows himself a small smirk. “Perhaps I thought he’d show more restraint.”

Peter snorts, shifting in his chair. “It should have worked, you know,” he says, petulant. “Unrequited love is such an easy way to serve the Lonely.”

Elias looks up to meet Peter’s eyes when he says, “You would know.”

Peter looks terrible. That is to say, physically he looks the same as ever, broad-shouldered and bright-eyed, smiling that same bland, impenetrable smile. But there’s something even more unclear about him than usual, even more insubstantial. Peter has never really been fully present in his company, but now he’s hardly here at all. 

It’s a struggle, but he looks away, back to his documents, giving Peter at least the illusion of privacy. He steadies his breathing carefully. He had been confident that Peter was strong enough to pull himself back together again, and he was right. He’s pleased, really.

“Now that’s hardly fair.” The tone of Peter’s voice hasn’t changed at all, as light and jovial as ever, but there’s a thinness to it that Elias doesn’t know whether to attribute to emotion or recent trauma. Perhaps, in a Lukas, the two are the same thing. When Peter doesn’t elaborate, Elias presses his hands flat on the desk and considers his approach. He’s surprised to be interrupted. “I’m sorry about your ritual.”

“No you’re not,” he snaps, a regrettable reflex, and his fingers curl against polished wood.

“No,” Peter agrees. “I’m not. It sounds terrible, really, watching and being watched. Better than some of the alternatives though. You know, on my way back, I came across an interesting bit of information about the Mother of Puppets, and I’m curious to see what your Archivist will make of it. If you’d be willing to make another wager.”

Still without looking up, Elias smiles.


	12. Mixed Feelings (Melanie, Helen)

On the third day of her official work stoppage, Melanie went down to the darkest corner of the Archives and knocked on the door that wasn't supposed to be there. The delay between her knock and the creak as it opened was neither particularly short nor particularly long, and she tried not to read too much into it one way or the other.

Helen never smiled, exactly. Melanie suspected that that was for the best, given how pointy she was even without exposing her teeth. But she did have a sort of friendly look that she got that wasn't entirely about her human-appearing face that felt the same as a smile, and she was wearing it now. Melanie smiled back at her in relief. "I know it's been a while," she said apologetically.

"Has it?" Helen said mildly. "I'm afraid I still don't quite know what to do with your fixation with linear time. But you are very welcome to come in." She stepped back from the door, holding it open, and sure it was a little menacing, between the vertigo-inducing twist of the corridor beyond and the unsettlingly vague silhouette of Helen herself, but really, what wasn't menacing in her life any more? Melanie stepped inside.

The relief was immediate. Like walking into an air conditioned room on a hot day when you hadn't realized how terrible the heat was until it suddenly wasn't there and feeling normal was suddenly the greatest you've ever been. She sagged a little, leaning against the wall, which kicked off a bout of vertigo that was still all the better for being a change.

You always felt watched in the Magnus Institute, and in the Archives particularly; she'd known that from before she ever stepped inside. It was one of the first things people said when they told you about going in to give a statement. She'd thought she was used to it, but it had been getting worse these past few days. Since she'd told Jon she wouldn't be doing her job any more. It couldn't be a coincidence, she wasn't that naive, but she still liked to think that it wasn't because she'd told him, specifically.

Helen led her down the corridors, past some doors and through others, down a pathway that was never the same twice and never made any kind of sense, to the same room where they usually talked: small, cozy, with a couple of overstuffed armchairs and a minibar and something that might have been a fireplace unless you looked too closely at it. If it looked an awful lot like her dad's living room sometimes, Melanie tried not to think about it.

Melanie sank down into a chair with a sigh, relishing the sense that she was at last alone in her own mind. Even going outside the Institute, to therapy or to Georgie's or to get a few drinks, didn't stop the watching so completely. Helen handed her a glass of wine, her reach implausibly long from where she was stood at the bar, and Melanie took a deep drink. You never knew how it was going to hit you, Helen's wine, but that was part of the fun.

She'd been sitting there for a few minutes, eyes closed and spine pleasantly slumped into too much cushion, when Helen said lightly, "Have you come just to hide away from Beholding, then? If I were a person I think I might be insulted."

"You're not, though," Melanie said without opening her eyes. "Insulted. Or human."

"No." Helen sounded amused. She always sounded amused these days.

Melanie sipped at the wine, thinking. Or trying to think; it didn't seem to work well here, trying to hold onto a thought for more than a moment or two, never mind trying to string them together. She figured she could blame that for the way she didn't know she was going to say, "I don't think I can come here any more."

The room composed itself into the impression of Helen raising an eyebrow. "Really."

She still sounded amused, but there was an echo to it, a prickling irritation that Melanie was sure was carefully calculated to remind her that she was still, after all, the guest of a monster. "Really." She swallowed, her mouth dry and full of tannins. "I'm not – I'm not a monster." She hadn't planned to say that, either. Maybe this had been a bad idea.

Helen hummed. "Not in any useful sense, no," she agreed. "So because you're not a monster, you won't associate with them any more, is that it? I'm afraid you may not have much choice in that department." She was sitting with her chin in her hand, elbow propped on her crossed knees, in a posture that almost perfectly mirrored the one Melanie's therapist tended to take halfway through a session. Which ought to be a coincidence, but almost definitely wasn't.

_"Are you sure about that?"_ her therapist's voice echoed in her head, that bland, vaguely cheerful question she never stopped asking until Melanie could justify her answers. Melanie closed her eyes, working her way back through the question until she found the place where it caught, snagging on the difference between objective reality and what she was afraid of. "I have some choices," she said carefully. "I may not be able to leave, but I can try to do better than I've done before. Not," she added quickly, more because offending something like Helen seemed like a terrible idea than because she really believed it, "that I think spending time with you is doing worse–"

"Of course it is," Helen said cheerfully. "You're quite right. We all have choices." She stood up and brushed her skirt straight, an oddly human gesture for someone who'd once told her how much she enjoyed not having a body any more. Melanie's gut twisted at the memory of that easy companionship. _All monsters together._ Basira had been the odd one out, then. Melanie wasn't so sure she would be, now.

Melanie stood up, too, steadier on her feet than she'd feared. Helen seemed – oddly distracted, as if something in their conversation had set her thinking. The door slipped open without even the pretense of a human gesture, and it led directly back into the Archives, no corridors to be seen. Melanie bit back the impulse to ask if she was all right; it wasn't an answer she had any right to after that.

Stepping back into the Archives proper made her head throb and the space between her shoulderblades itch, and she snarled a curse in the general direction of Elias's old office. At least, she thought bitterly, if she could never escape the way the Eye watched her, she wouldn't have to deal with the way it came crashing back.

At therapy that week, when Cora asked how she was doing, Melanie laughed shakily and said, "I guess I broke up with a friend."

**Author's Note:**

> Please come yell about TMA with me, I have too many feelings  
> [@j_quadrifrons](https://twitter.com/j_quadrifrons), [backofthebookshelf](https://backofthebookshelf.tumblr.com)


End file.
